5-year plans are a failure, says Nitish

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has questioned the efficacy of successive five-year plans, insisting that they had failed to deliver on their stated objectives in the absence of a proper appraisal mechanism.

"All the talks of inclusive growth have failed to address the problem of exclusion," said Kumar during his inaugural address at a two-day national seminar on Development: Challenges of Exclusion and Strategies for Inclusive Growth, at the AN Sinha Institute of Social Studies.

Kumar's skepticism followed a lack of response from the Manmohan Singh government to his persistent demand that Bihar be granted 'special category state' status.

"Drawing up of five-year plans has become a routine exercise that has ended up increasing disparities in society and among various states," he said. He added that the will to implement the plans was missing.